Greatwall Studios Graphic Design

I definitely would have done so today when I cursed it out with a blue streak while shoveling several hundreds, if not multiple thousands of pounds of snow. I’m very glad my kids helped to shovel the front walk, so I wasn’t responsible for 100% of the property, but it was still a very high percentage that I cleared myself, over two or three attempts throughout the day. I hope I made it cry. That I ruined it’s self esteem, and made it feel like less of a thing. By this point in the winter, I fucking hate snow.

My back feels like shit, and I had to take a much needed nap today. I am exhausted nonetheless. I pray we get rid of 90% of it before we get any more this winter. UV must have been high today because we had significant snow melt today aswell.

Finding it hard to sleep tonight. I’ve been rolling around in this bed for two hours now trying to get back to sleep. To no avail. I’m not ready to get up and start my day, but sleep looks to be lost to me in these wee hours of the morn. I don’t feel like starting to shovel. I think playing a video game or watching a movie are out. Hmph! YouTube it is then. I’m almost to 450, and then on my way to 500 consecutive days of writing. Woowzers. I was starting to get an inkling the other day for a new short story idea. Out in space, obviously. That seems to be where my mind wanders to. Straight up isolationist fiction. Thanks Covid! Easy to write about sad isolated people when we’ve been living in bubbles for the last three years or more now. Will give me an excuse to crack the giant solar system & universe books I got for Christmas from the Smithsonian! They looked so glossy! Can’t wait to do some story research! Giddy-up.

Had a really busy week this week. Thought I had got ahead of the curve on it, but was only partially successful at that. Could have been much worse. Still in a good place though. Chin up! Chipper outlook makes things easier to take. Yes! Can do attitude. Like water off a ducks back.

Could be an equally busy week ahead too. March Break looms on the horizon as well. Seems our winter didn’t feel like starting until February around here, so perhaps we’ll have all this snow and cold until deep into March or even early April. Should make the ski hills happy if that’s the case. Maybe I’ll take my eldest out snowboarding one day over the break. I’d love to get back onto some downhill skiis. Though I am worried about doing permanent damage to a leg or my head. Giv’er! I’m sure I’ll have more to say once the sun comes up on this fine March the 4th of 2023. Saturday – I am in you.

Isn’t so much the cold, or the blisteringly icy winds, but the fact that it makes my legs itch to the point that I scratch them until I bleed. I’m not sure if I have drier skin than normal, or if I have some sort of condition. But cool/cold weather will make my legs go beet red, and itch so badly I could claw my skin off if I don’t warm up in a reasonable amount of time. I can usually avoid this with two layers of long johns, thick pants, and snow pants, but it didn’t work so well this morning. Mind you I skipped the long John’s in favour of the snowpants. But I’ll have to rethink that later today at school pick up. As I am still sans car, so far more walking to be done until we get the second vehicle back from the shop. Yippy!

I have a long list of items to edit for today. Let us hope we are getting closer, rather than farther from the mark with each successive round of edits. Fingers crossed. Still have the french language versions to do, but I’ll need proper translations for that. Lots of legalese to parse. So best left to the professionals to look after that portion of the project.

Today is Friday, incase you were unaware. Another week into 2023! March has started. And not to mention that March break is just around the corner. Nine days off with the kids underfoot. Yay! Board games, video games, and maple syrup duties. I wonder if any kids movies are out in theaters or newly released on disc. They are too little for much of what I watch on streaming services. Which means the majority of the films I own are unsuitable for kids of their age. Makes a home bound movie date just that much harder to do.

I did manage to sort through three closets this week. Which makes me happy. It was a lot of shuffling materials between them. But I sorted them out, cleaned up the shelves, and segregated the belongings contained within, so that now, I don’t have to worry about the kids getting into my old office attire, or finding expensive sweaters crumpled on the floor of a closet with dirty hand/foot prints on them. I also managed to thin out my eldest t-shirt drawer, full of I’ll fitting shirts, and stuff they won’t wear. You can actually open & close the drawer now! Bonus! Will need to tackle pants next. I think we’ve had a growth spurt as lots of pants don’t go below the ankle any more. Box it up and keep it for the next kid down the line! New stuff in, old stuff out! Gotta keep the line moving. Anyway, I have lots to do today. So I best get cracking. Ciao Bella!

Have been dealing with this few a couple years now, as both pockets started to go, and now the central zippers have given out too. The fabric is willing where the metallic teeth elements are but the slider itself is not. These were very well aconstructed garments back when I hot them. I have three, two bulky heavier material sweaters, and a lighter material one. I guess I’ve had some of them for a decade or more so they don’t really owe me anything, but I’m still unhappy about it. Perhaps I’m being petty, but I would like to think that gear this pricey would stand the test of time.

For the most part they still keep me warm, and give me a semi secure spot to put my phone. If I half zip it I can atleast stop the phone from falling out, which is a plus. That’s my gripe for today. Time to eat, and get on with work. Gotta raise the funds to pay for this new grinding, vibration, noise from the front end of my wife’s vehicle. Round and round we go. Brakes, wheel bearings, rotors, calipers, tie rods… the list of fixable consumables is endless. Blargh!

It has been a busy one today, let me tell you. What a Hump-Day it has turned out to be. Had to red line it from 8:30am until a little while ago when I actually broke to eat my breakfast/lunch. I think I’ve managed to get ahead of the bulk of my work with one coordinated mad dash at it. Had to spot fill some gaps on a couple projects for another client inbetween all these new items. But I feel I am in good stead, as I wait on high resolution final assets from external partners. Or maybe not, who can tell this early on. Good place to be if all is well. I feel slightly less uncomfortable now. Bit of a panic when 13/14 new items come in at once that are all slightly related in one form or another. Well two camps of artwork, but roughly joined. If you know what I mean. Even had some new Photoshop compositing work added into the mix today. Good to stretch those muscles every now & again.

No major clear outs today. I got through some closets yesterday, and that seems to have satiated my desire to purge/clean/reorganize matters. I’d love to do much, much more. But I can only move around so many things without input from the rest of the family. Clothing swaps, donations, garbage runs. It has to be coordinated. My kids seem to cling to old clothes and stuff that they never wear, just to artificially inflate their closets. Pass off the too small/don’t like – don’t wear items, and make room for the next size up gear we have stored away. Keep the chain moving. Takes effort, both physical and mental to stay on top of it. Plus I’d love to reclaim the space from all this unused, or unwanted gear. House just feels better when every single closet and corner is not packed to the rafters with unused clothing of every shape, colour, cut & design.

Part of me loves the minimalist ideal, and part of me wants cozy eclectic collections of things. Hard balance to strike around these parts. School pick up in an hour. Back to work then! Ciao Bella!

Is just me after shoveling even more snow. On the plus side it’s only about minus one outside, so I didn’t freeze my ass off, though with the increased temperature the snow felt heavier, and was compacting under the shovel. So a toss up as to whether that is a win or a loss. I’m grossly sweaty now either way. Going to need to jump back through the shower. Although with more snow coming all day today I will have to go out for at least a round two, and later on possibly a third time. So I’ll hold off on rinsing off for right this second.

It’s times like this that I kick myself – again – for not having a snowblower, or having outdoor speakers to play music while I shovel. Music makes just about all things better. Especially tedious or repetitious jobs. I love to clean and work to my personal music collection. Not all music is good working music. I worked at this one distribution centre that played elevator muzak over the phone lines, and atleast eight times a day Copacabana played on repeat. I also had a severe case of micromanaging immediate supervisor. I was the one and only member of her team, and she sat at my elbow and pointed on my screen for eight hours a day. I was forever washing finger print smudges off my PC screen. Yes, the art department – consisting of us two people, operated on PC. Had to relearn all my quick keys and everything. Veering off topic here. Fat older and sweaty from shoveling snow. There all caught up for Tuesday February 28th, 2023. Best start gathering up your tax info, as the season of misery is set to begin.

I’m going to sit and enjoy some breakfast before I clock in for work today. I’m hot and irritable right this second. Not a good combo for precision work on food quality labels. I need to chill out for a few, and get some waffles in me. Mmm waffles. Chock full of fat man inducing calories, but by god are they delicious! Quick to get up to temperature aswell. Oh goody! And on that note of pure gluttony, I will bid you adieu. Ciao Bella!

Starting to feel a little claustrophobic with all of the winters accumulated junk hanging around as of late. Did a deep dive clean up of my office, which resulted in me hanging two framed posters I’ve had for at least a decade, possibly only eight years or so. Opening some packages of pens and pencils, and throwing away twenty one year old paints that had gone rock solid. It was my very pricey high viscosity, high pigment white and black paints. No way to revitalize them at this point. The cheapo plastic containers they came in had poorly fitting lids, and my aluminum foil cap/insert didn’t hold up over all that time. Oh well. No point holding on to twenty one year old spoilt paint. More room on the shelf for my Murphy’s Oil, and Windex bottles. Get those off of my work surface. I also need to take some wood working supplies out to the shop, but as I don’t want it to warp, I have to keep it inside for now. I just want it gone! Damnit, but not ruined. That shit was expensive. I also took the time to build a second alligator clip tree to house my new 4.5″ high clips. Get them out of their wrappers and onto the desk in a useable fashion. I added my sanding sticks into the mix too. Still waiting on my decal setter solution, and panel line ink. Not to mention the Tamiya paste I ordered to clean up seam lines. Lots going on in there this weekend. If I had my way, I would buy a metallic peg board for my office to hang over my model building station, but I need to move some larger purchased sculptures before I could do that. I would also like to build a utensils holding station to get more of my work surface back. Fling all that gear up on a wall, or cubby system, and reclaim the desk for working. Right now I only have 1/3 of the desk for working on, the rest is covered in tools, and consumables. I really, really need to attack all of the drawers and closets in this house. We have so much extra stuff that should be donated, or put into rotation to get used up. I’m terrible myself for saving things until later, or for a suitable occasion, only for the thing to have gone off by the time you feel you should actually use it. I hate that. Money wasted. What a rip-off! Argh!

Not for nothing but we had a homework blitz this weekend to get my eldest ready for their next book talk. Book read, report worked out orally, then dictation typed up fixing any chronological errors, and then six or seven run throughs to practice all the words and get comfortable with the material. I think the kid’s going to be ok. Then after gymnastics we need to practice for tomorrow’s Yellow Belt testing. Fingers crossed! We’ve been doing a fair amount of prep for it, so I think we are in a good place.

No matter. We are back to Domestic Duties Monday. Laundry is underway. I will vacuum at some point today. I have some new projects that came in on Friday evening, and this morning to attend to, so I best be off soon.

Incidentally it is also Friday, so yay! And brr that’s cold AF. Anyone from up north might scoff at that lowly -23, but for here, that’s a tit nipply. Make the thighs go numb even while you are walking around. I’m very glad that I was gifted a longer coat for Christmas. As up until now all of my winter coats would stop at my hips, and any wind whatsoever would bleed through my clothes and freeze my groin. Now, not so much. That extra eight to ten inches of insulated fabric stops me from having an ice cold groin. Love it. Five stars. Do reccomend! I knew it was bitterly cold when the kids were able to just walk right into the school at morning drop off, instead of having to wait for the bell. Good thing too, as I didn’t wear any additional layers, and was starting to numb up a bit. Although to be honest, the top of my thighs frequently go numb, even when sitting or lounging around, so that’s not a very high quality tell for anything substantial.

I expect this afternoon to be busier than most. A couple clients have print deadlines for today, though one set has been really quiet this week. Must be playing catch up due to all the conferences coming up in March. That would be my guess anyway.

Plans for the weekend? Nope. Nada. None. Nothing that I can think of. We are elbow deep into a cold snap so no wood working this weekend either. Had to put that on hold – again, after dropping below zero. I can partially heat a very small portion of my shop, but only if it hovers around zero or slightly higher. Get this low and it’s a lost cause, a losing battle. A cast iron fireplace would heat it no problem, but you need permits, a stove, holes for vent pipes, and then enough room around the stove to not immediately set everything on fire. So that will be a no from me dawg! Other option is to use a rigid foam to insulate the walls, and cover over it with plywood. Also expensive and time consuming. But probably better in the long run. To retain heat created within, and block out external hot/cold temperatures. We’ll see what shakes out over the coming years.

Recently finished book two of the N.k. Jemison trilogy, and am 1/3 of the way through book three. Nearly all three books done in February. Not bad. Not bad at all. If you recall I was worried it might take me months to read them all. And here we are heading into month three of the year with almost 10 books read. Nine from cover to cover, and one that I might (not) go back to after some more time has passed. I’m looking at new releases that are to come out in late March and mid April to add to the list. Just might do the twelve this year. Possibly add one or two more if I play my cards right. And on that bomb shell, I’ll call it. Ciao Bella!